Touchstone Folk Fest ft. Fotis Vergopoulos & Shushan Kerovpyan

FOLK FEST is an occasion when folks gather and play music. On Saturday 25 March Fotis Vergopoulos & Shushan Kerovpyan will be ending their BE-NTH tour in Utrecht. For this occasion we celebrate their arrival in our town with another FOLK FEST at Touchstone! Utrecht's finest greek trad musicians Ilias Konstantinidis, Giannis Leloudas, Argyris Plekas(also known as Rembetiko Against the Machine) will join forces with Nikos Tsop and Kinsmit to warm up the stage with original tunes. Later on Fotis & Shushan with a 6 string bouzouki, a double bass and two voices will take us on a musical journey between Greece and Armenia, with some detours in the Latin American world… Their minimal orchestration offers an original approach to these repertoires.

ON STAGE:

Fotis Vergopoulos

Shushan Kerovpyan

Ilias Konstantinidis

Giannis Leloudas

Argyris Plekas

Nikos Tsop

Kinsmit

Doors open: 19:30

This is a donation-based event, with the donations going to the functional needs of our space and to the needs of the touring artists.

About the featured artists:

Fotis Vergopoulos (bouzouki, voice)

Fotis Vergopoulos is a passionate bouzouki player since his early childhood. Born in Melbourne, Australia, he then grew up in Koroni in the Pelopponese. After six years spent studying back in Australia, he settles in Athens in 2012 and plays since then in many formations (among which Rebeti, and the Vasilis Tsitsanis Orchestra) and tours internationally. He has played with many big figures of Greek music such as Babis Goles, Manolis Pappos, Agathon Iakovidis, Dimitra Galani, Martha Frintzila.

Shushan Kerovpyan (double bass, voice)

Born in Paris to a family of musicians, Shushan Kerovpyan was immersed from early age into Armenian and Middle-Eastern traditional musics, and learned Armenian modal chant by oral transmission. Being partly American, she was also strongly influenced by folk and soul music. She plays and sings in Collectif Medz Bazar (French-Armenian-Turkish band), The Circle Orchestra (Greek music), Akn Ensemble (Armenian liturgical choir), Kerovpyan ensemble (Armenian traditional and troubadour music), and occasionally takes part in other various projects.